10 Year Old Killed While Watching Television

Elvira Campos

After finding the site that keeps track of gun deaths, I began thinking about the real people that have lost their lives since Newtown, now some 4000+ people, and I thought I might try to find these real people and post something about one or two of them a day.

Ten year old Elvira Campos was watching television with her parents at home in North Highlands, California when (police believe) at least two shooters stood outside the house and emptied seven bullets into the house.

Elvira died and her parents were both injured but have already been released from the hospital.

Two other Campos children, one not at home and the other in another room working on a computer, were not involved in the shooting.    Police are questioning the adult brother who was not at home in the belief that the killing may have been gang related.  The Campos had lived in the house for only two years.

Across the country, a 14 year old girl sitting on a city bus in Queens was killed when a gunman prayed bullets at the bus.

Hofstra Student Killed in Hostage Standoff

After finding the site that keeps track of gun deaths, I began thinking about the real people that have lost their lives since Newtown, now some 4000+ people, and I thought I might try to find these real people and post something about one or two of them a day.

Andrea Robello and her twin sister Jessica lived together just blocks from Hofstra University where Andrea was a junior majoring in public relations.  On Friday (May 17), gunman and several times convicted felon Dalton Smith broke into their home in what is believed to be a robbery attempt.

Andrea, Jessica and Jessica’s boyfriend, among others, were at home and were taken hostage by Smith.  Several hostages escaped; one of them was able to call the police.  The police showed up at the home and at least one officer entered the home where Smith held Andrea Robello in a headlock, with a gun to her head.

As Smith tried to get to the back door and noticed the officer in the hallway, he pointed the gun at the officer who subsequently fired several rounds.  One of the shots killed Andrea and seven rounds struck Smith and killed him.

Smith’s weapon a handgun (illegal) had two rounds in it:  one in the chamber and one in the magazine.  According to a detective on the scene, Smith did not fire any shots.

There were warrants out for Smith’s arrest on a parole violation.  He had been released on parole in February, having served a nine year sentence for robbery.  The officer who shot Andrea and Smith was a 12 year veteran of the police force.  It was not clear whether he had followed protocol.

(this particular story was widely publicized, perhaps because the officer mistakenly killed the hostage.  It was covered all over the world, including in the Daily Mail, the Canberra Times and the Taipei Times).

Kierra Was Killed At a Graduation Party

Life Happens in the Back Seat

Subaru is onto something with their “backseat” campaign.  Anyone who has ever grown up in a family with a car has lived a lot of life in the backseat.  Whether it is going to the grocery store or on a summer vacation road trip, kids grow up seeing the back of their parents’ heads and grownups pass the time listening to the peanut gallery behind them.

Car seats for kids were actually invented in 1898.  They came in the form of a bag hooked to the seat that was intended to keep the child in the back or keep them from falling in the case of a quick stop.  A legitimate “car seat” did not come on to the market until the 1930s, and it was not until the 1960s that Swedish automakers came up with rear facing car seat to minimize injuries to children in auto accidents.  Even in the 1970s, only the most safety conscious of parents put their children in car seats,but by 1984 nearly half the population 0-4 was riding in some kind of car seat.  (from History of the Car Seat).

Any kid who has grown up in the last part of the twentieth century started their life looking at the back seat of a car, and when they were old enough, looking at their parents’ heads.   The backseat is where kids learn to sing, where they learn to play games that teach them to be alert to changes along the road of life.

Nowadays, kids play video games or listen to their ipods, riding in cars that have built-in coolers and screens in headrests that allow them to watch videos instead of the back of their parents’ heads.  Life in the backseat reflects the lives we lead outside our cars.

I remember selling my vintage Karmann Ghia in order to get a safer car when my son was born.  As a single mom, I went everywhere with him in the backseat.  My son has grown up in the backseat of VWs, Mazdas, and Volvos.  We did a lot of talking that way and he did a lot of learning.  Sometimes it was my turn to learn.   One particular day —  when 3 year old Ian was mad at me — I remember him saying : “My mind wants to hit you.”

When I remarried, the backseat became the place where we blended our families, dropping them off at school, at the movies;  taking them to the beach, the ballpark, the soccer field.

When they were old enough to drive, the backseat emptied out, presaging the empty nest that soon would come…  and later, the grandchildren who resurrect the peanut gallery, chattering away and looking at the backs of our heads.

19 shot at Mother’s Day Parade in New Orleans

After finding the site that keeps track of gun deaths, I began thinking about the real people that have lost their lives since Newtown, now some 4000+ people, and I thought I might try to find these real people and post something about one or two of them a day.

The youngest person among the nineteen who were shot at the Mother’s Day Parade in New Orleans is believed to be 10 years old.  According to another news report, there were 18 shot — among them two children and six women.  None of the shots were fatal.

The shots were fired by either two or three gunmen who fled the scene after leaving victims scattered across four corners of an intersection at 1:30 p.m. in the afternoon.

The shooting appears to be random, and a police spokeswoman called it a “very unusual occurrence.”

That’s an interesting comment, since New Orleans has one of the highest murder rates in the country, and Governor Bobby Jindal backed an NRA-backed constitutional amendment that requires any change to the gun laws in Louisiana (including the part that keeps felons from buying guns) to fall under “severe scrutiny.”